Memorializing your furry pal – Eden Prairie Native Information

Losing a pet is a uniquely troublesome expertise, and Stacy Bettison is aware of that. 

The former Eden Prairie resident has turned that understanding right into a enterprise aimed toward serving to pet homeowners protect recollections of their animals, notably as they age.

Capturing significant photographs of a pet may be troublesome, particularly with a cellphone digital camera and an animal that gained’t sit nonetheless. Bettison based Gray Face Photography to assist seize recollections of senior pets throughout the metro.

Bettison mentioned she has all the time felt a robust reference to animals, sitting together with her household’s outside cats of their St. Cloud dwelling. She fondly remembered taking the cats on nature walks round her yard and in surrounding cornfields.

“It was a very happy place for me to be with the animals, because, as anyone who loves an animal companion, well, those animals just love you unconditionally,” Bettison mentioned.

Her curiosity in pictures started on a visit to El Salvador whereas learning journalism at Emerson College, the place she photographed the folks dwelling there and frolicked connecting with them.

Bettison mentioned her curiosity in pictures turned towards animals in 2013 when she began volunteering with the Minnesota Horse Welfare Coalition. She takes photographs of mistreated horses to unfold consciousness about animal neglect.

After beginning to observe The Tilly Project, a senior pet pictures community, Bettison mentioned she realized she might do this sort of work to serve and assist her group. At the identical time, Bettison had her personal senior canine, a German shepherd and golden retriever combine, and was going through anticipatory grief about shedding her pet. 

She started photographing folks’s pets to construct her portfolio and fell in love with doing it. She chats with shoppers throughout the classes about their pet and the recollections they’ve with their animal companions, which may be an emotional expertise each for her shoppers and for Bettison.

“Ultimately, this is all about developing connections with people and animals,” Bettison mentioned. “And for me, that’s what my life has been about for all these years.”

Tina Paulson, an Eden Prairie resident, reached out to Bettison for photographs of her canine Olaf as he neared the tip of his life. She didn’t have many footage of her canine and wished some to assist protect Olaf’s reminiscence.

“I knew his health was dwindling, I knew he was getting old and he was slowing down. I thought, ‘It’s getting close,’” Paulson mentioned. “So, I called Stacy before he got too weak and ill, and we got some good pictures of him.”

Paulson had Olaf for eight years and adopted him from The Bond Between, beforehand Secondhand Hounds. Olaf was a rescue discovered on the road in Kentucky, and from the second she adopted him, they have been inseparable.

Bettison made the pictures course of simple and comfy, Paulson mentioned.

“She kept the dog super chill, like he wasn’t stressed to have somebody here,” Paulson mentioned. “She just made it really comfortable.”

Paulson added that she struggled to get good footage of Olaf. Bettison had ample expertise photographing animals and helped not solely get robust pictures of her canine, but additionally seize his persona.

“I myself could not get a good picture. So when Stacy came and I figured, OK, she knows how to take animal pictures,” Paulson mentioned. “She captured Olaf.”

Bettison paid shut consideration to each the consolation of the picture shoot and the standard of the ultimate product, Paulson mentioned. When she obtained a photograph with a crack in it, Bettison insisted on changing it.

“She made sure I was 100% happy with the outcome,” Paulson mentioned. “She gave me tons of pictures to choose from, and she had gone through and edited some. I even told her, ‘I’m fine with the crack in the glass.’ And she’s like, ‘No, not until this is right.’ She took care of everything and just delivered a new picture to me.”

Paulson mentioned she already plans to have photographs taken of her new rescue canine, Zen, as he will get older.

Bettison mentioned she takes further care to hearken to tales concerning the animals she images and to present pet homeowners an area to reminisce.

“I give them a lot of space to talk about their dog, because people like to tell the story of their animal and how they met the animal, how they got it,” Bettison mentioned. “There’s always a story around when you get your animal. Everyone kind of remembers when they get the animal.”

Speaking with shoppers and taking footage of their pets may be an emotional expertise for Bettison, too, she mentioned. 

“I have a soft spot for any animal on the planet, and to know that an animal is coming to the end of their life is an emotional process for me too,” Bettison mentioned. “When I’m processing the pictures, it’s very bittersweet because you see a beautiful image that we’re able to capture, but then also the sadness around the loss.”

Bettison mentioned she hopes the pictures course of itself is useful for her shoppers.

“I think it helps, from an emotional perspective, (that) they have someone who’s willing to listen to their animal’s story,” Bettison mentioned. “So in that way, they feel like they’re seen and that their anticipatory grief today is acknowledged.”

Those interested by having their pet photographed can guide a session by way of Gray Face Photography’s website.